A ‘blogger,’ his wife, Jeff Bezos and the value of media properties

The short version of this story is that an accomplished journalist’s bid for a bigger platform gets spurned.

The longer version is a bit more interesting: Ezra Klein, the columnist and creator of the Wonkblog site from the Washington Post, is planning to leave the newspaper after failing to win support for a new website he wanted to create, according to a report in The New York Times.

The Times report, quoting four unnamed sources, said he wanted a double-digit million investment. Publisher Katharine Weymouth and owner Jeff Bezos, the Amazon chief who only recently bought the newspaper for $250 million, said no, according to the report.

The broader story is that of big media companies and the micro brands they’re fostering. Nate Silver famously left The New York Times to bring his stats-minded form of journalism to Walt Disney’s ESPN and ABC.

Walt Mossberg and Kara Swisher have taken AllThingsD out from under The Wall Street Journal brand to their own site, Re/code. The Journal meanwhile has started WSJD under the direction of former MarketWatch editor Jonathan Krim. The Journal and MarketWatch are both owned by News Corp., the publisher of this report.

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